How to Sell and Advertise on Snapchat

Learn how to advertise your shop on Snapchat, and start running your online dropshipping business with Oberlo, today! It’s free!

How to Advertise on Snapchat: Snapchat Marketing Guide For Beginners

Snapchat is one of the world’s most popular social media platforms. Users can send each other brief ‘snaps’ of images, videos, or texts that disappear after they’ve been opened. In addition, users can also post ‘stories,’ which are visible to everyone on their friends list, and consist of compilations of individual snaps. No doubt, this is certainly one of the more fun and creative social media platforms out there, but did you know that it’s possible to advertise on Snapchat, too? Snapchat is one of the most exciting new ways to engage an audience thanks to the live glimpses you can share into the happenings of your shop. Plus, through Snapchat marketing, customers can connect back to you in equally interactive ways.

With access to an enthusiastic audience, using paid ads on the platform is one of the best ways to approach the question of how to advertise on Snapchat. With this form of Snapchat marketing, there are multiple ad combos that reflect the innovation of the channel. These include many different types of ads like the basic snap ads format, along with sponsored lenses, sponsored geo filters, Snapchat discover, and snap to unlock features. When you advertise on Snapchat, you can really get just as creative as if you were using the platform strictly for recreation. These ads are comprised of multimedia features including sound, sight, and motion. Therefore, Snapchat marketing gives your ads lots of versatility as you can combine many different elements to produce a memorable ad experience for your brand or products. Some common ways businesses advertise on Snapchat are through the use of graphics, still images, gifs, slideshows, and videos. Like snaps, they will display to your audience for 3 to 10 second durations.

Snapchat marketing is ideal for ecommerce businesses with a lot of mobile users since the app is made for smartphones first and foremost, and the ads play as regular snaps would after users view their friends stories. That in mind, there are certain additional guidelines to check as you advertise on Snapchat, which can be reviewed in detail here. There are three different Snapchat marketing purchase options to boot. In terms of achieving success through Snapchat marketing, we recommend opting for the Ad Manager, which functions on a dashboard the way most other marketing channels do. There is also the option of purchasing geofilters or working with Snapchat partners, which serve as other perfectly viable ways to advertise on Snapchat.

How to Sell on Snapchat

Now that you have an overview of Snapchat marketing and how to advertise on Snapchat, now you might be wondering how to sell on Snapchat. In this day and age, with the capacities of the internet growing so rapidly, ecommerce entrepreneurs have to get creative in their selling strategies if they want to stay competitive and up to date. While this may sound intimidating at first, it can actually be quite fun as it leaves more room for experimentation with ever-changing options for boosting conversions and making more sales. Considering how to sell on Snapchat may not be the first place you think of when it comes to selling your products, but it can actually be an amazing platform for making extra profit.

So, when it comes to answering the question of how to sell on Snapchat, one of the best ways to communicate your brand, promote your site, and entice potential customers to shop with you is through ‘storyselling.’ Because the story feature has the greatest visibility, it’s an excellent place to have a little fun and connect with the right audience in a way that is truly unique from other platforms. Snapchat marketing as a way of promoting your brand in the name of conversions and sales can sound like very serious work, but it’s actually advisable to really get into the tone of the Snapchat community by using the many features on the app to make your messages more interesting in the name of grabbing viewers’ attention. These include emojis, filters, location tags, and more. Also respect the art of the story by making sure that there is continuity in each post, with a clear beginning, middle, and end. Using this story format is, therefore, a great way to build suspense about products or promotions.

That said, don’t make each and every snap simply about announcing deals or trying to coax people onto your site. Instead, intermix it with entertaining content or useful tips that will grab your potential customers’ attention. For instance, if you sell cosmetics in your e-commerce shop, you may want to include some makeovers with before and after images or short makeup tutorials testing out some of the products in your inventory. Doing things like this will help build your audience and keep existing followers engaged. Announce your pitches and calls to action at the end of the story including a QR code with exclusive deals or discounts on your site to reward people for watching.

Lastly, use your other social media channels to promote your Snapchat by emphasizing that viewers can find exclusive content there. You may even want to extend the promotion of your products to influencers who already have a lot of visibility with your desired audience. Taking from our cosmetic shop example, you could reach out to existing online beauty queens and see if they would point viewers in the direction of your shop in order to purchase the products used in their own snap story makeup tutorial. You could even invite the influencer onto your own Snapchat account to create a some extra buzz around your store.

Where to Find Products

If you are still learning about ecommerce and getting started with your first shop, or if you have already tried your hand at traditional ecommerce business models and are looking for something different, you may be wondering just where to find products to promote on Snapchat. Just as venues for marketing and advertising products have continued to grow and diversify, so have means of finding products to sell in the first place.

Dropshipping is quickly on the rise because it allows entrepreneurs to sidestep certain pitfalls related to more conventional forms of ecommerce including having to stock and ship all merchandise yourself. This can be expensive and increase the financial risks associated with starting your own online business. With dropshipping, you simply import products online from third party suppliers into your ecommerce store. Then, when a customer makes a purchase, the supplier will send it directly to him or her. This drastically reduces startup costs and many hassles associated with managing inventory yourself.

That said, it’s important to not look at dropshipping is a flawless solution to the challenges of ecommerce. Instead, it’s best to treat it like a business and invest some energy into researching the best tools for achieving ecommerce success under this business model. That’s why we’ve created the Oberlo app and Chrome extension to help manage your dropshipping business. Its numerous features automate and streamline the whole process so you can focus more on devising clever ways of marketing and advertising your business with the many different tools and channels that keep cropping up on the web. Some of our users’ favorite features about the Oberlo app include easy importing from your suppliers to your site, automatic order fulfillment, and both inventory and price auto-updates.

The best part is that Oberlo works seamlessly in conjunction with Shopify, the world’s leading ecommerce software, which allows you to set up a custom domain name for your online store. With Shopify, you can create a beautiful, professional website from which to sell your products without any design skills. Together, these two programs make launching a successful dropshipping business something that virtually anyone can do. With Shopify and Oberlo, you can spend your efforts on those captivating Snapchat stories that are sure to swoon potential customers.

Oberlo is a dropshipping tool. Dropshipping is a low-risk business model that allows you to sell products without bulk ordering. Using the Oberlo app, suppliers will manufacturer, package and ship out products to your customers for you. You can sort items through order volume to see popular items that have proven to sell well. You’re free to test different products to find the best impulse buy products to sell on your store without having to order large quantities in advance.

What makes Oberlo great? Oberlo automates countless aspects of running an online store. You can import product images and copy in one click. You can also do one-click order processing saving you time – an entrepreneur’s most valued resource. You can choose from millions of great products from a variety of niches. You can build a low-maintenance business that allows you more time to work on marketing and customer support so you can scale your store. Pricing can be easily automated and updated with a click of a button. You can track your customers’ orders to answer customer inquiries and ensure deliveries are made promptly. Sorting through the best and fastest delivery methods is easy too!

How does it work?

Oberlo dropshipping is one the easiest ways to start an ecommerce business. It doesn’t require much capital investment. You can even run a profitable business from your couch.

Build an Ecommerce Store

Use this checklist to launch your store with Shopify. No coding required!

Fill Your Store with Products

Browse over 20M products and import them to your store in just a few clicks.

Suppliers Ship Your Orders

After you make a sale, send the orders to your suppliers, so they ship them directly to your customer.

Since the company’s founding in September, 2015, Oberlo merchants have sold over 85 million products around the world.

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